A refrigerator is an electric home appliance for freezing or refrigerating foods to keep them in a fresh state for a long time. Generally, a refrigerator is provided with a freezing chamber and a refrigerating chamber, and an ice making device for making ice is installed in the freezing chamber. Such an ice making device includes an ice tray for malting ice using supplied water, and an ice bank for storing the ice made in the ice tray.
According to a conventional ice making device thus constructed, an ice tray is removed from a freezing chamber and supplied with water and then installed again in the freezing chamber. When the water contained in the ice tray is frozen by cold air flowing through the freezing chamber and ice is completely made, the ice is separated therefrom by twisting the ice tray. The separated ice is stored in an ice bank, and the stored ice is used by taking out the ice bank from the freezing chamber or a rear side of a freezing chamber door.
However, such a conventional ice making device for a refrigerator has the following problems.
As described above, according to the conventional ice making device, the ice tray should be removed from the freezing chamber and supplied with water and then installed again in the freezing chamber. Hence, there is a disadvantage in that a process of filling the ice tray with water is complicated.
Furthermore, in the process of installing the ice tray filled with water to the freezing chamber, the contained water may be splashed to the outside. Hence, there is a possibility that the freezing chamber will be soiled.
Moreover, in the process of filling the ice tray with water, water may penetrate into a rotation mechanism for twisting the ice tray. Hence, the water that has penetrated into the rotation mechanism is frozen, and thus, the rotation of the ice tray may be interrupted.